Top Items:
Hans Nichols / Bloomberg:
Obama Said to Name Jack Lew to Replace Geithner at Treasury — Obama Said to Name Lew Tomorrow to Replace Geithner — President Barack Obama plans to name White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew tomorrow as his choice for Treasury secretary, replacing Timothy F. Geithner, a person familiar with the process said.
RELATED:
Kevin Roose / Bloomberg:
Jack Lew's Terrible Signature May Grace Dollar Bills Now — Obama's America. — Jack Lew, President Obama's reported pick to replace outgoing Treasury secretary Tim Geithner, is known as a no-nonsense backroom negotiator with wonkish tendencies, who is admired on the left and grumbled about on the right.
Discussion:
Washington Wire, Politico, ABCNEWS, Economix, Wonkblog, The Atlantic Online, New York Times, Mashable! and Mediaite
David A. Graham / The Atlantic Online:
Who Is Jack Lew, Obama's Nominee for Treasury Secretary?
Who Is Jack Lew, Obama's Nominee for Treasury Secretary?
Discussion:
Wonkblog, The Fix, Post Politics and Economix
Manu Raju / Politico:
Senate vs. President Obama over Cabinet
Senate vs. President Obama over Cabinet
Discussion:
The Week, The National Memo, Business Insider and NationalJournal.com
Politico:
Why President Obama is picking fights with Congress — Barack Obama is looking for a few good fights. — Obama, the same president who campaigned twice on breaking the cycle of conflict in Washington, sees the utility — even the necessity — of rattling Republican cages as he plunges …
Discussion:
NBC Politics and The Hill
RELATED:
Alexander Burns / Politico:
Hagel pick: Final snub of George W. Bush — The final insult to George W. Bush's foreign policy may have come in the form of a Republican ex-senator from Nebraska. — Chuck Hagel's nomination for secretary of defense has stirred opposition on both the left and the right …
Discussion:
CNN, The Moderate Voice and Taegan Goddard's …
Josh Marshall / Talking Points Memo:
More DC Play-Acting — Nominations lose steam or gain steam.
More DC Play-Acting — Nominations lose steam or gain steam.
Discussion:
The Moderate Voice, Reuters and Israel Matzav
Judy Kurtz / The Hill:
Scalpers hawking members' inaugural tickets online — Free presidential inauguration tickets given out by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Sen Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and other lawmakers are being hawked online for thousands of dollars. — The scalping of the tickets technically is not illegal …
Discussion:
Political Watch, Texas on the Potomac and msnbc.com
RELATED:
Sheryl Gay Stolberg / New York Times:
Richard Blanco, 2013 Inaugural Poet
Richard Blanco, 2013 Inaugural Poet
Discussion:
Advocate, ABCNEWS, Towleroad News #gay and Colorlines
Andy Kroll / Mother Jones:
Revealed: The Massive New Liberal Plan to Remake American Politics — A month after President Obama won reelection, America's most powerful liberal groups met to plan their next moves. Here's what they talked about. — It was the kind of meeting that conspiratorial conservative bloggers dream about.
Discussion:
Washington Monthly and The Agonist
Alexander Bolton / The Hill:
McConnell to take lead in entitlement talks, with Boehner in back seat — Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is poised to play a bigger role in negotiations to reform entitlement programs in the wake of the tax deal he helped forge last week. — Lawmakers see the passage of a bill …
Discussion:
Hot Air, The Plum Line, CNN, Angry Bear, Patterico's Pontifications and Booman Tribune
RELATED:
Ginger Gibson / Politico:
McConnell takes a hit from the right
McConnell takes a hit from the right
Discussion:
Campaign for America's Future
Dana Milbank / Washington Post:
Can Chris Christie rescue the GOP?
Can Chris Christie rescue the GOP?
Discussion:
msnbc.com, Hot Air, Daily Kos, Business Insider, Ballot Box, Weekly Standard and Post Politics
Jeffrey M. Jones / Gallup:
In U.S., Democrats Re-Establish Lead in Party Affiliation — In 2012, 47% identified or leaned Democratic, 42% Republican — PRINCETON, NJ — An average of 47% of Americans identified as Democrats or said they were independents who leaned Democratic in 2012, compared with 42% who identified as or leaned Republican.
Discussion:
The Moderate Voice, msnbc.com, The Fix, The Daily Caller, Politico, The Political Carnival, Hot Air, Ballot Box, Post Politics and National Review
Aaron Dykes / Infowars:
Piers Morgan and Guests Discuss Shooting Alex Jones — Daily Beast writer Buzz Bissinger says Piers Morgan should “pop” Alex Jones with a semi-automatic weapon. — Infowars.com — CNN and the gun grabbing media are now calling for Alex Jones to be shot the day after his heated appearance with Piers Morgan.
Discussion:
LewRockwell.com Blog and Shot in the Dark
RELATED:
Josh Levs / CNN:
Biden: Obama exploring executive orders to combat gun violence
Biden: Obama exploring executive orders to combat gun violence
Discussion:
Weasel Zippers, Piers Morgan and This Just In
James Hohmann / Politico:
At 100, still little love for Nixon — Richard Nixon would have turned 100 Wednesday, but about the only people marking the occasion are historians, family members and loyalists from the disgraced 37th president's administration. — And even they're slowly dying off.
Discussion:
Washington Monthly, USA Today, The Week, CNN, Taylor Marsh, ABCNEWS and Althouse
RELATED:
Sarah Parnass / ABCNEWS:
Five Key Legacies of Former President Richard Nixon On His 100th Birthday
Five Key Legacies of Former President Richard Nixon On His 100th Birthday
Discussion:
Alan Colmes'Alan Colmes' and Politico
Daniel Halper / Weekly Standard:
Biden: Obama Considering ‘Executive Order’ to Deal With Guns — Vice President Joe Biden revealed that President Barack Obama might use an executive order to deal with guns. — “The president is going to act,” said Biden, giving some comments to the press before a meeting with victims of gun violence.
Discussion:
protein wisdom, The Gateway Pundit and Maggie's Notebook
RELATED:
Paul Krugman:
Rage Against the Coin — (From Talking Points Memo). — Well, the trillion-dollar-coin thing — deal with the debt ceiling by exploiting a legal loophole to have the Treasury mint one or more large-denomination coins, deposit them at the Fed, and use the cash in the new account to pay bills — has really taken off.
Discussion:
Althouse, JustOneMinute, The Daily Caller, Washington Monthly, Business Insider, The Week, The Jawa Report, Balloon Juice and Eschaton
RELATED:
Ryan Cooper / Washington Monthly:
Harvard Law School Professor Laurence Tribe on the Legality of #mintthecoin
Harvard Law School Professor Laurence Tribe on the Legality of #mintthecoin
Discussion:
American Prospect, Paul Krugman, Business Insider, PostPartisan and The Atlantic Online
Megan McArdle / Asymmetrical Information:
Washington Goes Platinum
Washington Goes Platinum
Discussion:
Mother Jones, Washington Monthly, American Prospect and Hot Air
Jonathan Chait / New York Magazine:
Why Republicans Won't Bargain With Obama Again — James Capretta, writing at National Review, lays out what looks like the emerging Republican strategy on the debt ceiling. Rather than take up President Obama's offer to cut Social Security and Medicare in return for higher revenue through tax reform …
Discussion:
Prairie Weather, p m carpenter's commentary and Wonkblog
The New / New York Times:
Transcript of Nate Silver's ‘Ask Me Anything’ on Reddit — Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight took questions Tuesday on the popular social news site Reddit's “Ask Me Anything” section. What follows is an edited transcript, with the questions and answers sorted into several subject areas.
Tom Jensen / Public Policy Polling:
Images of NRA, Congressional Republicans on the decline — PPP's newest national poll finds that the NRA's image has declined over the last three weeks following Wayne LaPierre's controversial press conference the week before Christmas. — The NRA now has a negative favorability rating …
Discussion:
Taegan Goddard's …, Mediaite and msnbc.com
Amy Odell / BuzzFeed:
DC Sex Workers Prepare for Huge Influx of Inauguration Partiers — If you require the services of a stripper or dominatrix over inauguration weekend, be prepared to pay extra. — Image by Shutterstock — When Steve Baker talks about the inauguration, he gets a little giddy.
Discussion:
The Gateway Pundit
Sahil Kapur / Talking Points Memo:
Chuck Hagel Expanded On ‘Aggressively Gay’ Slur In 1998 — Then-Sen. Chuck Hagel's remark to the Omaha World-Herald in 1998 that Clinton ambassadorial nominee James Hormel was “openly aggressively gay” was only a part of what Hagel told the paper about his opposition to Hormel's nomination.
Discussion:
BuzzFeed, PostPartisan, The Plum Line, The Daily Dish, Towleroad News #gay, Washington Examiner and The Reaction
Taxpayer Advocate Service:
NATIONAL TAXPAYER ADVOCATE DELIVERS ANNUAL REPORT TO CONGRESS; FOCUSES ON TAX REFORM, IRS FUNDING AND IDENTITY THEFT — WASHINGTON — National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson today released her 2012 Annual Report to Congress, identifying the need for tax reform as the overriding priority in tax administration.
Discussion:
New York Times and AEIdeas
RELATED:
John D. McKinnon / Washington Wire:
Report Highlights Costs of Tax Code's Complexity
Thomas Kaplan / New York Times:
Cuomo to Propose Broader Ban on Assault Weapons — ALBANY — Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, pushing New York to become the first state to enact major new gun laws in the wake of the massacre in Newtown, Conn., plans on Wednesday to propose one of the country's most restrictive bans on assault weapons.
Discussion:
Politico, CBS News, Hit & Run, CNN, U.S. News, The Week, msnbc.com, Capitol Watch and Post Politics
RELATED: